If this is your first visit, be sure to
check out the FAQ by clicking the
link above. You may have to register
before you can post: click the register link above to proceed. To start viewing messages,
select the forum that you want to visit from the selection below.

Driven to the "Fringe".

I've seen a lot op-eds in a wide variety of places that seem to be terrified that people are somehow being driven to the "fringe" of ultra-right thought by Trump, by globalism, by well, anything, really.

Supposedly, law-abiding, tax-paying, people are being incited to become Kluxxers or something similar due to recent political events. Presumably, these people would have muddled along being inoffensive had Clinton won but now they are increasingly becoming "ists" of various types.

Are your neighbors, employers, professors, clergy, friends, relations, retailers, or government officials suddenly becoming Nazis due to recent political events?

Simply voicing a divergent view will not qualify here. Are they denigrating you? Shunning you? It needs to have some actual impact in your life.

If that's the standard, the Nazis never were Nazis, as long as you aren't Jewish or Romani or one of their other targeted groups.

If your standard is the "standard" there is no standard.

Killing people would qualify. Planning to do so and having central offices for that very thing, would do so. Trying to eliminate all your government sanctioned evidence of doing those things would qualify. Doing Youtube lectures on why it's "okay" to kill Jews or sexually enslave Christian women and girls would qualify.

Are you completely ignorant of 20th century history? Do you not see the difference between shoving Jews in ovens and merely voicing a divergent view on a college campus or in the workplace?

Those things are not the SAME thing.

Simply disliking the current media/government hegemony is not the SAME thing as raping Jewish women and doing vivisection on their children.

If you don't see this distinction, there's no common ground between us.

Killing people would qualify. Planning to do so and having central offices for that very thing, would do so. Trying to eliminate all your government sanctioned evidence of doing those things would qualify. Doing Youtube lectures on why it's "okay" to kill Jews or sexually enslave Christian women and girls would qualify.

Are you completely ignorant of 20th century history? Do you not see the difference between shoving Jews in ovens and merely voicing a divergent view on a college campus or in the workplace?

Those things are not the SAME thing.

Simply disliking the current media/government hegemony is not the SAME thing as raping Jewish women and doing vivisection on their children.

If you don't see this distinction, there's no common ground between us.

I've noticed a definite uptick in anti-Muslim sentiment, with even a few Facebook comments supporting registration of Muslims. The parallels to historical examples of religious and cultural persecutions are obvious. But I'm not a Muslim, so it hasn't affected my life, and you stipulated that "Simply voicing a divergent view will not qualify here" and that "It needs to have some actual impact in your life." Not being a Muslim or having Muslim heritage, my life won't be impacted even if Muslims were being interned.

On some great and glorious day the plain folks of the land will reach their heartís desire at last, and the White House will be adorned by a downright moron.
-H. L. Mencken

I've noticed a definite uptick in anti-Muslim sentiment, with even a few Facebook comments supporting registration of Muslims. The parallels to historical examples of religious and cultural persecutions are obvious. But I'm not a Muslim, so it hasn't affected my life, and you stipulated that "Simply voicing a divergent view will not qualify here" and that "It needs to have some actual impact in your life." Not being a Muslim or having Muslim heritage, my life won't be impacted even if Muslims were being interned.

I've noticed a definite uptick in anti-Muslim sentiment, with even a few Facebook comments supporting registration of Muslims. The parallels to historical examples of religious and cultural persecutions are obvious. But I'm not a Muslim, so it hasn't affected my life, and you stipulated that "Simply voicing a divergent view will not qualify here" and that "It needs to have some actual impact in your life." Not being a Muslim or having Muslim heritage, my life won't be impacted even if Muslims were being interned.

When your friends tell you they think all American Muslims should have to be entered on a registry, how do you respond to that?

Not where I breathe, but where I love, I live...
Robert Southwell, S.J.

They weren't talking to me, and I elected to just shake my head and scroll on by. I find Facebook a terrible place to actually try and debate anything.

Oh, so you chose the "it doesn't have an impact on my life, so I won't speak up" option? I guess it's understandable then that you are so familiar with the plight of the non-targeted groups in the Nazi example.

Not where I breathe, but where I love, I live...
Robert Southwell, S.J.

Oh, so you chose the "it doesn't have an impact on my life, so I won't speak up" option? I guess it's understandable then that you are so familiar with the plight of the non-targeted groups in the Nazi example.

Yeah, sure. First they came for the Muslims and I did not post on Facebook -- because I was not a Muslim.

On some great and glorious day the plain folks of the land will reach their heartís desire at last, and the White House will be adorned by a downright moron.
-H. L. Mencken